Whitman’s setting [The Black Swan] is colorful and eclectic in idiom…. there is genuinely magical music to depict the famous black swans at Düsseldorf’s Holterhof castle….

The Black Swan shares many similarities with Britten’s music theatre pieces, including a felicity in setting words so that they shine through and across a melody…. The opera is paced well, moving swiftly through its dozen scenes and musical interludes.

In his first opera [The Black Swan], Whitman displayed the savvy skill of a mature composer. He knows how to write dramatic music that soars into lyrical melodies, filled with allusive atmosphere and rich emotional textures.

Many contemporary operas consist largely of sung dialogue; their composers carefully avoid the big arias, songs and rousing choruses that opera composers inserted whenever the plot gave them the slightest excuse… But [in A Scandal in Bohemia] Whitman isn’t afraid to seize opportunities for pure musical numbers. When Holmes impersonates a drunken workingman, baritone Markus Beam gets to sing a lyrical song. Watson’s watch aria as he waits for Holmes is another high point…. The love duet between Holmes and Adler is a musical tour de force.

Whitman’s score [A Scandal in Bohemia]… paints the stage with epigrammatic bits of color… The musical tide rose, instrumental color expanding and vocal writing widening the perspectives. The musical interplay between Heimes and baritone Markus Beam moved through a range of solidly crafted lines that freed the emotions within.